PhD Karen Kleberg Hansen

Department of Drug Design and Pharmacology

Affiliated with UNIK project no. 11

Title of thesis: Intestinal sensing of fatty acids and 2-monoacylglycerol

Abstract: The role of the intestine in appetite regulation is an expanding research field of relevance to global health concerns such as obesity and metabolic syndrome. Ingestion of dietary fat is believed to activate a battery of intestinal sensing mechanisms and pathways, including G-protein coupled receptors, gut hormone secretions, and metabolic and neuronal pathways, which regulate feeding behavior in laboratory rodents, and probably also in humans.

Overall this thesis highlights that fat is not just fat and the molecular differences among lipid species are determinant for the intestinal sensing and might ultimately influence feeding behavior in mice.